GOVT2060 02 2017 Liberalism

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES ST. AUGUSTINE FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCES

GOVT 2060 International Relations: Theories and Approaches Fall 2017

Topic 2 Liberalism In this session, we explore the background to Liberalism, the first major paradigm in International Relations. We detail the context of its emergence in the interwar years and identify its major authors, assumptions, strengths and weaknesses. How relevant is this perspective for analyzing contemporary International Relations is the question we seek to address here. 1/30

ab1234.yolasite.com

2/30

Course content

• The History and Evolution of the International System • Levels of Analysis and Foreign Policy

Theory and Paradigm a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena

Theory a coherent group of tested general propositions, commonly regarded as correct, that can be used as principles of explanation and prediction for a class of phenomena

Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962): Scientific paradigm universally recognized scientific a philosophical and theoretical framework of achievements that, for a time, provide model a scientific school or discipline within which problems and solutions for a community of theories, laws, and generalizations and the researchers experiments performed in support of them are formulated Alternating periods of The model of the reversed pyramid normal science = one dominating model revolution = the model undergoes sudden drastic change IR has never experienced one dominating model → debates 5/30

6. Russia to be assured independent development and international withdrawal from occupied Russian territory 7. Restoration of Belgium to antebellum national status 8. Alsace-Lorraine returned to France from Germany 9. Italian borders redrawn on lines of nationality 10. Autonomous development of Austria-Hungary as a nation, as the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved 11. Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, and other Balkan states to be granted integrity, have their territories deoccupied, and Serbia to be given access to the Adriatic Sea 12. Sovereignty for the Turkish people of the Ottoman Empire as the Empire dissolved, autonomous development for other nationalities within the former Empire 13. Establishment of an independent Poland with access to the sea

14. General association of the nations – a multilateral international association of nations to enforce the peace (League of Nations) The League of Nations: Wilson's League for Peace (10min04) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0ldr18Rnho, http://vimeo.com/9989564#at=0 (downloadable mp4)

17/30

Utopian liberals: 19th century belief = inevitable progress of mankind WW I = unprecedented horrors → discredited power politics doctrine of balance of power = rejected history ≠ guide to the future ↓ extend citizenship to include membership of the global community of nation states Collective security: concepts and practices of domestic society → IR ↓ Emergence of IR as a discipline 1918 the first chair in IR at Aberystwyth, University of Wales Liberalism - Assumptions states are the most important IR actors 18/30

• impact of ideas on behaviour, equality, liberty and dignity of the individual • need to protect people from excessive state regulation The individual = seat of moral value and virtue People = ends, not means

better-informed and more mobile individuals ↓ more complex world ↓ states' capacity for control and regulation decreases ↓ State-centric → multi-centric world ↓ An increasingly pluralist world = more peaceful

25/30

The billiard ball (realist) model and the cobweb (sociological liberal) model: One country - two images

(economic and social affairs) coalitions both within governments and across them; NGOs, transnational corporations, international organizations primary goal of states = welfare, not security ↓ Institutional liberalism (NEOLIBERALISM)